Writing & Design for Games & Narratives

Strunking Grammar

Geoffrey K. Pullum, whose name I know from his writing at the excellent Language Log blog, which is excellent, recently gave us a condemnation of Struck & White’s ubiquitous Elements of Style. In it, he writes:

It’s sad. Several generations of college students learned their grammar from the uninformed bossiness of Strunk and White, and the result is a nation of educated people who know they feel vaguely anxious and insecure whenever they write “however” or “than me” or “was” or “which,” but can’t tell you why. The land of the free in the grip of The Elements of Style.